[ laughter ] >> brian: he's head over heels in love. >> steve: you got your best man right there. >> i think so. >> steve: jeff will stick around for the after the show show and so is walter, if you would like to see it, log on. >> gretchen: tomorrow dick morris, geraldo and jeanine curl. bye. bill: here we go, 9:00 in new york. the first presidential debates in the books as the presidential race kicks into a higher gear. for an hour and a half in denver these two men went eight. which side has the momentum now. welcome. martha: what a night. bill: did you sleep? martha: very little but that's okay. i'm martha maccallum. most of last night it was a domestic topic evening. they talked about the struggling economy and what each side would do to fix that situation. president obama and governor romney each had a chance to

explain what would happen to your taxes they were in charge. >> the question is not where we have been but where we are going. >> it's going to take a different path, not one x have been on, not the one the president described as a top down cut taxes for the rich. that not what i'm going to do. >> it's not possible to come up with enough loopholes for individuals to avoid raising the deficit or burdening the middle class. >> there will be no tax cut that adds to the deficit. >> i will take ideas from anybody, democrat or republican as long as they are advancing the cause of making middle class families stronger and giving opportunities to middle class. >> i have got five boys. i'm used to people saying something that not always true but repeating it hoping i will believe it. i will not reduce the taxes paid

by high income americans. >> we do better when the middle class is doing well. by giving them those tax cuts they have more money in their pocket so maybe they can buy a new car. >> under the president's tax policies middle americans have been buried. they have been crushed. martha: joe biden had a bit of a gaffe using that same line and mitt romney put it back at him last night. candidates will barely have time to catch their breath. they get back on the campaign trail today. the president will be in colorado and wisconsin. the romney camp moves along to the swing state of virginia. you have got 13 electoral votes up there. bill: we find john roberts in fishersville, virginia. >> we have a concert here in the heart of the shenandoah valley. country music star trace atkins

will be joining the governor. chris christie promised a restart of the campaign. it's unanimous the government won that debate. the snap polls after the debate showed that. the governor promised he would aggressively counterattack against any mischaracterizations the president threw his way. an did that all night on the offense. he did offer some level of detail. >> i will eliminate all programs by this test if they don't pass it. is the program so critical it's worth borrowing money from china to pay for it? if not i will get rid of it. obama-care is on my list, i apologies, i use that term with all due respect. >> the big question for the romney campaign, is it going to start to move the needle in his

direction. bill: we heard from the romney team, what are they saying about the obama team? >> reporter: there are an awful lot of democrats saying they don't know why the prr obama didn't bring his "a" game. some democrats described his body language on stage as being uncomfortable. james carville said it didn't look like the president wanted to be there, it was too much of a bother. here is what david axlerod. >> the president is never satisfied with his performance. he's always challenging himself. he will review it and if he wants to make some changes in the next debate he will do so. what he was satisfied with is he went and told the american people the truth and i think he's fairly well convinced that governor romney didn't meet that standard. >> reporter: a little more than a week before the second presidential debate. they will be hitting it hard in the debate.

romney and ryan in friendly territory here in fishersville. the rally won't be until later on today because they want all those sound bites from last night's debate to marinate before romney and ryan take it stage here today. bill: john roberts in the western part of virginia. martha: while all this marinates. president obama has been hit with some criticism from some republicans for bringing former president bill clinton into the mix. >> we tried both approaches. the approach governor romney is talking about is the same sales pitch that was made in 2001 and 2003. and we ended up with the slowest job growth in 50 years, we ended up moving from surplus to deficits, and it all culminated in the financial crisis since the great depression. bill clinton tried the approach i'm talking about. we created 23 million you are in

jobs. we went from deficit to surplus, and businesses did very well. martha: don't forget that bill clinton did very well for this president at his convention. but there is karl rove's tweet. the twittersphere was going braisey last night. karl rove said, mr. obama, you're not bill clinton. bill: what did charles think. syndicated column tonight charles krauthammer said there was a clear winner. >> romney won big. he won by two touchdowns. when he steps on the statement gives him stature. when he performs like romney did it changes the mow men tim. bill: krauthammer went on to say one debate won't win the election but it might change the

course. martha: vice president joe biden says governor romney did not go far enough in explaining his plans specifically to the american people. >> governor romney laid out a fundamentally different philosophy. he called for a tax plan that would these massive cuts for the wealthy but refused to explain how copay for them without raising tax on middle class families. instead he just denied how big these tax cuts were. martha: the romney campaign said they did lay out specific he will ets how they would pay for those. biden will debate paul ryan in danville, kentucky next thursday. bill: a former new york city mayor republican candidate rudy giuliani said the president, all he wants is bigger government. he had a consistent theme. government important, government has to help, government has to

stimulate the private economy. every answer to every question by barack obama was more government. whether it was education, taxes, healthcare, green energy, more government, more government, more government. bill: the mayor says he praises governor romney for his performance. martha: they are paying attention in the key battleground state of ohio. this has been a tough territory ohio for the past couple weeks for mitt romney in the polls. some voters hit the local bars. their we action a bit split. watch. >> you have got four more years of obama or 8 years of romney. you can do four years fast. eight years is a long time. >> this is the first time they have seen them side by side and they are learning a lot here. i think romney exposed a lot of obama's weaknesses. and deficiencies. so i would give the slight edge

to romney. martha: wisdom come be from those gentlemen. some in the crowd did not care what either candidate had to say. one man said he already made up his mind and he voted early. that changes the die ma'am nick a lot of these cases as well. coming up, is it a new day for mitt romney? that is the big question. he did well last night but will it change the game at all? is the president not you one who needs to play catchup? most people think he will. we'll get some reaction from both campaigns how their respective candidates performed last night. that coming up a couple minutes away. bill: remember fox news? where else would you be. the next big debate is one week from today. joe biden and paul ryan scare off in danville, kentucky. we'll have complete coverage of that as we move toward next

thursday. martha: right on the heels of the discussion, fox news alert were talking about creating jobs. we have bad news that came in a while ago from the labor department. unemployment applications first-time jobless claims rose last week to 367,000. that was up from 4,000 the week before. let's bring in stu varney, the host of varney and company on the fox business network. that's a lot of people to walk in and file for the first time. >> reporter: it's actually up 4,000. the point is that's a big number. it paints a negative picture of the overall employment situation. it means there is more firing, more layoffs than there is hiring people. it means the economy is pretty much at stall speed. it's not in good shape. that's a different picture than the picture painted by president obama in deet bait last night. listen to there is for a second.

>> over the last 30 months we have seen 5 million jobs in the private second store created. the auto industry has come roaring back and housing has begun to rise. but we all know we have a lot of work to do. the question here tonight is not where we have been, but where we are going. >> reporter: based on the numbers out today and even more important numbers that come out tomorrow we are not going in the right direction. the employment picture is bad and may be getting worse. the president's only hope of getting the unemployment rate down is if literally hundreds of thousands of people drop out of the labor force. we'll find out what's happening for sure tomorrow morning. martha: we have seen that trend happening in the past. sometimes we see an improved number about it turn out so many people stopped looking for work which is a discouraging sign in all of this. we get one report tomorrow. do we get another one before the

election. >> reporter: yes, we do. on the friday before the election we get the last jobless number. since january 2009, 8,400,000 people have dropped out of the workforce. bill: history tells us quite a bit. in december of 2007 jobless claimed stayed high above 300,000. spiked in early 2009. weekly claims must consistently fall before 375,000 to indicate hiring is strong enough to lower the unemployment rate. the jobless claims are still at 8.1%. martha: we have so much more to

tell you, all about last night's debate. mitt romney widely declared last night many winner. how big of a win is it and where does this race go from here. steve hayes will weigh in with us. bill: the president mentioning the middle class 19 times. did that help? >> under the president's policy middle income americans have been buried. they have been crushed.

martha: the department of healta deadly meningitis outbreak. 10 people have died. tennessee's health department says the victims were injected with a tainted medication used to treat back pain. now pain management clinics across the country are on high alert. >> general contamination of products can occur. we are working with these facility to insure that the patients are notified they may have been exposed. martha: symptoms show up in 2-28 days after these injections. they include headache, dizziness, fever and slurred speech. the maker of the tainted drug says it is working with health officials to determine the

source of the infection. bill: our top story this morning. was there a big winner or big loser. steve hayes, good morning to you. this may be known as the split screen debate. the rnc was talking about there is early on last night. on the screen now, this is an image a lot of folks saw. mitt romney staring at the president and the president looking down at the podium and perhaps some notes in front of him. what do you make of that? >> it was really strike. it suggests the president was disengaged. he didn't want to be challenged in the manner mitt romney was challenging him and challenging him repeatedly. this is something barack obama hasn't been accustomed to whether it's internal debates in the white house where there are advisors nodding in agreement or white house press corps not

challenging him in a direct and confrontational but respectful way that mitt romney did last night. bill: does this change things? >> it could. the question going forward is whether mitt romney reshapes his campaign to almost mimic or imitate the aggressive bold style we saw from him in the debate last night. he was respectful but he was tough. he was aggressive with the president. he challenged the president on facts and importantly after challenging the president on facts after pointing out problems with his record he offered an alternative vision for the future. voters who watched the debate got a sense of what mitt romney would do differently in the next four years. one of the reasons he was so successful. bill: this was perhaps a moment where romney scored on the issue of the economy and jobs. and it goes directly to his business career. roll it and listen to the first

part of the screen here. >> i have been in business for 25 years. i have no idea what you are talking about. i maybe need to get a new accountant. the idea that you get a break for shipping jobs overseas is not the case. bill: i have been in business for 25 years and i have no idea what you are talking about. >> he did this several times. i thought it was very effective. and he did it when the president kept talking about this $5 trillion tax cut. romney said as often as you say that doesn't make it true. it was a direct challenge that turned out to be effective base romney wasn't doing it in a mean spirited way or disrespectful way and it set the president back because he didn't know how to respond. bill: i have heard a lot of people on the left. they are not satisfied with their guy's performance. you can argue people tune in and

cheer for their guy and boot other guy. but liberals in america are not happy with the president. why did this turn out the way it did, do you believe? >> it's a good question. the obama campaign before the debate was putting out that president obama was watching football. they wanted to give the impression that he wasn't obsessed with the debate. he wasn't going to be overprepared to project an air of copy dense and lower expectations. in this instance they may have made a mistake doing that because the president played down to most those expectations. bill: debate number two, do you think should wipe the floor again? it's a contrary view, but is that an effect? >> i don't think pope he is still president and you will have a media narrative that want the president to recover here that's going to want the president to do better than he did this time.

i think the president will have a difficult task. on the one hand he's got to be tougher and challenge mitt romney. on the other, he's still president. he can't seem to be beneath the office of the presidency. bill: thank you. steven hayes in washington. there is so much more to talk about and we shall with martha. martha: moral issues came up also how governor romney tide this to the economic debate. also, a few laughs. southbound wouldn't expect to show up in the presidential debates. and they are yellow. [♪] ♪

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martha: the president went after governor romney for his criticism of the wall street reform protection act known as dodd frank. >> in the past governor romney said he wants to repeal god frank, roll it back. the question is, does anybody think the big problem we had is that there was too much oversight and regulation of wall street? because if you do, then governor romney is your candidate. martha: massachusetts congressman barney frank slammed governor romney calling his proposal impossible. one thing i thought was so interesting in this segment is

when mitt romney came around and said was if you mr. president protected the five biggest banks in the country by making them too big to fail and in the process we lost hundreds of little banks around the country who had to fold. so you had mitt romney, who has classically been pegged the rich out of touch wall street type guy saying you are the one who protected wall street and let these others fall down. bill: ed rollins said this debate last night is all about mitt romney. because you want voters to sit at home and say maybe. and governor romney did that, hitting the president hard on record spending and the deficit. calling it at one moment immoral for america. >> i think it's frankly not moral for my generation to keep spending massively more than we take in knowing those burdens are going to be passed on to the next generation and they will be paying the interest and principle all their lives. the amount of debt we are adding

at a trillion a year is simply not moral. bill: you see the clock and it ticks. and the point he made, if you keep going this way you are going to add a trillion dollars to that debt year after year after year with no end in sight. effective moment. martha: the president went back to the prior administration and said he felt all of it happened on their watch. and that got very interesting, too. there was no discussion of fannie mae and freddie mac. i thought governor romney might turn that back on the president and say the government was also to blame in all of that. but they did get to a lot of things. they even got to "sesame street." social media exploded after this comments from governor romney. >> i'll eliminate all programs by this test if they don't pass it. is the program so critical it's worth borrowing money to pay for it in if not i'll get rid of it. obama cares on my list. i use that term respectfully.

i'm sorry, jim, i'm going to stop the subsidies to pbs. i like pbs and big bird and i like you, too, but i'm not going to keep spending money on things i have to borrow money to pay for it. martha: big bird woke and heard that. users posted 17,000 big bird tweets a minute. one such account @firedbigbird. bill: a year ago in a conversation with governor romney he said when i get one-on-one in the president he's going to say x and i'll say y. he will say "a" and i'll say "b." that was a year ago. he has been waiting a year. if you look at these snap polls. oftentimes this is an emotional

reaction. whether it's cbs or cnn there was a clear winner in this debates. martha: governor romney had take and lot of heat from conservative watchers of all of this who said he had yet to make a passionate conservative argument throughout the course of this campaign. i think those folks will be satisfied with what they saw last night. he was ago that and connected to what he was saying. he made his points. and he turned that key in a way that may satisfy the bill kristols of the world and the other people who had been negative on him. bill: danville, kentucky, next week for the vp debate. the economy the star of the evening it was topic "a" as to be expected. in moments both campaigns are here live to talk about why they believe their man pulled off a victory last night. >> for 18 months you have been running on this tax plan. five weeks before the election. you are saying the big bold idea

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martha: the economy dominated the discussion. toot question is, does anybody out there think that the big problem we had is that there was too much oversight and regulation of wall street? because if you do, then governor romney is your candidate. but that's not -- >> that's not the facts. we have to have regulation on wall street. that's why i would have regulation. but i wouldn't designate five banks as too big to fail and give them a blank check. that's one of the unintended consequences of dodd-frank. it's killing regional and small banks. martha: is today a new day for

that man, mitt romney? that one of the big questions everybody is talking about. here with reaction from the romney cam is artur davis, the co-chair for president obama's 2008 campaign but he is now a supporter of governor romney. >> good morning. you are is a said a supporter now. you had one of the prominent speeches at the rnc this year. what did you think of how your man did last night? >> i think had the most decisive begin in deet bait any scd candidate has had in the last 20 years. i'll be bipartisan about it. the two best debaters have been mitt romney and bill clinton in 1992. it was a decisive win on substance. mitt romney countered barack obama last night. came back at the president in a respectful way and the president didn't have answers. it was a win on substance last

night. martha: you are obviously a unique political player and observer of this process. you are the co-chair of president obama's campaign back in 2008. what brought you to the place you are now as a supporter and surrogate for mitt romney just four years later? >> i'm like about 7 million americans who voted for the president who don't plan to do so again. i'm like many americans who were democrat at one point who moved away from the democratic party. the democratic party ideas. part of it is policy. part of it is ideology and part of it is results. last night was a debate about result. what was telling to me. at no point did president obama lay out a case for what a second term is going to look like. i heard president obama say he was going to do one thing in his second term. he's going to raise some taxes in the second term that he didn't get around to raising in the first term. that's not much of an uplifting

vision to the american people. ronald reagan used to say around great compliewn kayer to when you have great things to communicate. barack obama did not have great things to communicate and that's why he struggled by all accounts. martha: there is no doubt in my mind the president and his camp will spend the next couple weeks spending a lot more time getting prepared and being ready. i don't think anybody will count out president obama in terms of how he will perform in the next debate. what are the romney folks going to do to get ready for the next round? >> this wasn't just about performance. the obama folks think it's style and performs and and looking down instead of looking up. last night was about substance. looked at president obama and said you paid for obama-care by cutting $716 billion from medicare. you didn't have to do it. president obama had no answer. mitt romney said president obama you talk about a few tax breaks for the oil and gas industry.

you have given much more tax breaks to the alternative energy energy and you have nothing to show for it. president obama just looked at him. at the end of the day barack obama couldn't engage on substance last night. the facts aren't going to get any better between thousand and the next two debates. the alternative energy market is not going to start working in the next two weeks. the obama economic policies aren't going to be working in the effect two weeks. it wasn't about style. it's about substance and obama not being able to stand on his own record. that record is not going to change between now and the next debate. martha: thank you for being with us today. bill: president obama telling the american people there is one pledge he will always keep. >> four years ago i said i'm not a perfect man and i'm no won't be a perfect president. that's probably a promise governor romney thinks i have

kept. you i promised i would fight every single day for the american people and the middle class. i kept that promise. if you will vote for me, then i promise i will fight just as hard in a second term. bill: this won't be long. but give me four minutes. the romney campaign says he was a clear winner on substance. >> mitt romney may have scored some style point during this theatrical debate performance but he failed on the facts and his credibility didn't pass the bar the american people are looking for. as we shuffled through the debate transcript and look at what he had to say, i think what the american people are left with are doubling down on fast-rising medicare, his magic math using a magic calculator to

pay for his tax plan. he says he will fight for education but he wants to cut the education budget by 20%. that doesn't sit well for people making decisions across the country. you called it theatrical and magic math. david axlerod conceded for governor romney this was a strong performance. do you concede the same? >> i concede after practicing more than any candidate in modern presidential history he delivered on his attack lines. bill: so it was just practice brought a winner for governor romney? >> i think practicing obviously paid off for him. but at the end of the day people are looking closely at his policies and he doubled down on a number of the failed policies that have been a huge problem for that campaign. bill: stop one moment, jen. you just concede, too, romney won icon creed he had a

theatrical performance. he may win some style points to for. but people looking at the choice in this election are not making a choice based on style points. they are making a choice based on substance. bill: apparently viewers -- i want you to get to these snap polls. 67% on cnn say romney won. snap poll on cbs say romney was the winner. there was another poll on cbs. 56% say they like mitt romney now more than they did before. what do you think about that? >> i don't think you can judge the long-term impact of a debate by insta polls the night of the debate. people will be look closely at what mitt romney said last night and what the president said. the president spoke directly to the people at home. he will fight for the middle class and protect the american people from the romney-ryan plan

medicare disaster. and proved he's willing to say and do anything to become president. fact checkers are having a good day today. they need a lot of coffee to keep up. bill: did you want your guy to fight more last night? >> the president didn't go into last night with a checklist of attack lines. he was speaking directly to the people at home. he wanted to speak to the american people like adult and lay out his economic policies and lay out his plans. bill: that wasn't my question. did you want him to fight back harder than he did? >> i think he fought back pretty hard when failed to give detail on his tax plan and fought back hard on plans to voucherrize medicare. they are looking for someone who will be a steady leader and i think the president exhibited that last night. bill: jen, thank you. you are allowed to go back inside and get warm.

martha: last night's most heated exchanges coming during the debate over the candidates' tax plans. claims and counterclaims were flying. so which plan is best for the middle class? that's what the american people will have to decide. we'll get to the heart of it in a fair and balanced dede bait right after this. p

martha: governor romney strongly defending his tax plan after repeated claims from president obama that it would hurt middle class americans. here is an exchange from last night. watch. >> under the president's policies middle income americans have been buried, they have been crushed. >> governor romney's policies call for an $8hill tax cut in addition to additional spending for our military. the average person making $3 million is getting a $250,000 tax break while middle class families are burdened further. that's not what i believe is a recipe for economic growth. >> virtually everything he just said about my tax plan is inaccurate. if the tax plan he described is

a tax plain would be asked to support would say absolutely not. i will reduce the share to high income individuals. i have got five boys. i'm used to someone saying things that aren't ultimately true but keep on repeating it hoping i will believe it. but that is not the case. i will not raise tax on middle income families. i'll lower taxes on middle income families. martha: by our count president obama mentioned the middle class 19 times, clearly a focus of every presidential election. let's talk about this. lanny davis joins me now. and jonah goldberg is the editor at large for the national review. welcome, jonah. lanny, you listened to all that. what do you think? >> i'm not very happy with the

president's performance. i think he did poorly. i agree with him on substance. i think he got the better of the exchange regarding the facts and the policy. but for the obama campaign to put the spokesman on and i'm sure she is doing her best and not to admit he had a bad night and to say we ought to do fact check when the fact checkers have rated obama's ads with four pinocchios. the way to do this is to say look at governor romney. smile, be gracious. don't look down and take notes while a man is talking to you. it's as simple as admitting he had a bad night. but on policy and substance i'm still voting for him. i know she doesn't believe she was saying as she was saying it. she was reading talking points and that doesn't help our cause of electing barack obama. martha: lanny, what would you say -- what do you think

happened last night? why do you think he was staring at his notes and looked unhappy and miserable by some observers. >> part of it is habit you'll. he had the ta -- he has the habn stead of look at a person he looks down and takes note. you can break somebody of that habit. get rid of the notes. you are not studying for an exam. he's a nice guy. it's his greatest asset. people like him. last night they didn't. and that is the key. and again i say the obama campaign rather than putting spin out should say, look, our guy had a bad night but he's right on policies and everyone would say okay, that honest. martha: jonah, let's get back to this issue of the middle class voter. many of whom watched this very closely last night. the president's whole pitch has been everybody should pay their

fair share. everybody is going to get a fair shake at life. how do you think these two gentlemen did on this issue? >> let me start with agreeing with lanny on the spin. i think it's bizarre. the substance of the spin is romney won on style. are they going to have the spinners for obama say mitt romney's style and theatrical guy and barack obama is th the wonky guy? the idea that he's a glib theatrical guy is bizarre. the basic problem. the romney campaign has not been great about pushing back hard enough on this. the basic problem is barack obama's argument is breathtakingly dishonest. he says mitt romney wants a $5

trillion tax cut. that's defensible because he doesn't want to lower the rates. then he says in order to pay for it he has to raise tax on the middle class. the study he's because that on admits it's making that. you. mitt romney has never proposed raising taxes on the middle class. you might as well -- it's just as plausible to say mitt romney is going to pay for this tax cut by invading canada and seizing their oil wells. it's fictional assertions they are passing off as fact and saying romney is campaigning on raising middle class taxes. meanwhile the only way to pay for all of the spend can that barack obama has done and will continue to do under his budget is to raise taxes. a dollar spent is a dollar taxed. >> style is important in debates. and john kennedy when people listened on the radio did not win the first debate. he won the presidency because

looking at the two of them on television, richard nixon lost the debate temperature that happened last night and barack obama has to do better on style. bill: in moments. what did herman cain think about mitt romney and the debate. he's here live. ♪ atmix of energies.ve the world needs a broader that's why we're supplying natural gas to generate cleaner electricity... that has around 50% fewer co2 emissions than coal.

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martha: four years ago she was part of the republican ticket. what did sarah palin think of the first debate of 2012? watch. >> mitt romney what is able to point out so many of these points that's of us in the audience if you will have been longing to hear barack obama be questioned about and have to give answers. barack obama did not have the answers tonight. he didn't have this buddy the teleprompter in front of him writing out -- somebody had

written out for him in all these years of being a candidate and the president. the answers. he finally had to be candid and rely on his own lack of experience and knowledge about how the economy really works to answer these points that mitt romney was making. martha: the former alaska governor warns the campaign wouldn't go down without swinging. bill: there are major developments on the war in syria. turkey launching retaliation attacks. shells from syria struck a border town wednesday killing five civilians. turkey's parliament authorizing retaliation. >> reporter: bill, we are just short of a war between syria and turkey. the turks are saying that authorization for force should serve as a warning to syria this

kind of aggression must stop. the syrians have not retaliated over the past 24 hours. this is one of the nightmare scenarios. midday yesterday that mortar shell landed inside of a turkish border town and killed five people. almost immediately the turks began their military response with heavy military shelling for 12 hours inside syria. also a diplomatic response invoking nato calling for an emergency meeting inside of brussels. over the past few months turkey amassed a large fighting force on their border with syria. we have seen tanks and heavy artillery. that country is on a war footing. will syria respond and take their licks and give an apology and move on from this. bill: leland vittert live from jerusalem there. martha: almost as important as

what was said is what was not said. coming up bill o'reilly joins us with his analysis. we are looking forward to that. bill: chris wallace is live ... >> you have been president for four years. you said you would cut the deficit in half. it's four years later and we have a trillion dollar deficit.

martha: brand-new reaction this hour to the first presidential debate of the 2012 campaign. president obama and governor romney went toe-to-toe last night, for the very first time the two men together on the stain. fascinating to watch the dynamics between the two of them. we'll see what happens that decides the next four years and who wins after the course of all these debates. good morning, everybody, brand-new hour of "america's newsroom." i'm martha maccallum. bill: i'm bill hemmer. i wonder how s & l is going to treat this thing. so far the polls so romney is the winner. how critical was this debate with 33 tkwaeus to go. here is chris wallace reacting only moments after the debate was over last night. >> what tonight reminded me more than any other debate was the first kerry-bush debate in 2004 where the challenger, john kerry

took the battle to george bush and bush the president seemed very uneyes, didn't seem comfortable and didn't seem like he wanted to be challenged. that's what i felt tonight. the challenger mitt romney felt more like in charge, was in command of his principles. martha: chris wallace anchor of his own show. >> now that i've had a nice sleep i see things definitely. martha: it's a fascinating calm par con to go back to george bush where he said, it's hard to be question he said there in the evening. what do you think president obama learned last night and what do you think we'll see differently next time around? >> i'm sure they prepared him at great length, but you've got to remember there is a bubble to being president and they don't get talked to that way in public, they don't get talked to that way in private, and i got to think that after four years,

because ace say it reminded me of george w. bush in 2004, that they don't like somebody getting in their face, and mitt romney got in his face, and romney's command of the facts was really quite astonishing. his arguments as to the differences between obamacare and romney care, his indictment of the obama record on the economy, very impressive and there were points, and we've talked about body long, and i think we've talked too much about it where romney was always looking directly the a the president and the president was looking down, frankly like a kid being scolded. it was not a very attractive comparison from the president's point of view. martha: we are looking at the split screen and it does not do a disservice to everybody, it's what we saw over and over and over last night. let's play a clip when they talked about simpson-bowles last night. i want to get your thoughts on that. >> i have my own plan. it's not the same as

simpson-bowles. in my view the president should have grabbed it. if he wanted to make adjustments do it take it, fight for it go to congress. >> that's what we've done, is we've made some adjustments, we are going to congress witness right now. >> you've been president four years. you said you'd cut the deficit in half, it's now four years later we still have trillion dollar deficits. martha: what about that, chris. >> for people who aren't following like this. simpson-bowles was the presidential commission. he was in charge of this commission. it was his idea. after they gave their proposals last december he ignored them, he never even mentioned them a month later in the state of the union speech. he does have a $4 trillion plan, a deficit reduction plan about it is filled with gimmicks. first of all it includes a trillion dollars that they already agreed to, the congress and the president, as part of the deficit reduction deal, the debt limit deal last august. any president if they come in its going to have that trillion dollars.

he also gets $800 billion in savings from night fighting the wars in iraq and afghanistan that we weren't going to fight anyway. there are all kinds of gimmick savings. having quickly said that, mitt romney's plan has a lot of smoke and mirrors too. obama pointed out you have $5 trillion from lowering tax rate. you have a $2 trillion increase in the pentagon and you say you'll get it from closing loopholes and you never identify any of the loopholes. that is a problem as well. martha: the comparison to a private debate that the romney camp would probably like better this morning would be reagan-carter. any thoughts on that? >> i was just going to say there are two more debates and that's what was the case in bush and kerry. you know obama is going to come back much harder. he's a competitive guy, i'm sure he knows he did poorly. romney better be prepared because obama is going to come back in the next debate in two

weeks. martha: they complained about them making him do his homework a couple of days ago, no doubt he's going to do his homework in the next two weeks. bill: chris christie predicted thursday morning would have the race in an entirely different frame. arguably he was right. martha: everybody gave him a hard time but he was right. bill: marco rubio was in prim time, the senator from florida, saying it's a new race, explaining why he thought the president looked off of his game. >> this president, you could see it in the body long he was so uncomfortable talk being about the economy, debt, taxes, because he doesn't understand the stuff. i think for the first time tonight it was revealed he doesn't understand how jobs are really created. martha: the obama camp coming out in the president's defense of course saying americans don't have any better idea after last night's debate about where governor romney would take this

country. here is stephanie cutter. >> the problems on this campaign is not the attack on obama, the lack in this campaign is his tax cuts, he denied having the tax wuts all together. martha: the next debate will be october 16th at hoffstra university. it will be a small town hall style. there will be questions on domestic and foreign policy. bill: there is no rest for president obama as you imagine. back to the campaign grind today, mr. obama holds a rally in denver. anded henry traveling live with the president in denverment what is the campaign saying this morning about last night? >> very chilly this morning in denver, chilly reception for the president last night from right to left. i spoke as to stewart stevens, and he said luke can't have bill clinton stand in for you in

these debates. it's the one man going head-to-head with the challenger. bill mahr said maybe the t-t doe president does need his teleprompter. when he loses bill mahr he's in a little bit of trouble. i think the president started long with trying to reframe everything. it's not about the last four years it's a choice for the next four years. >> the question here tonight is not where we've been, but where we are going. governor romney has a perspective that says if we cut taxes, skewed toward the wealthy and rollback regulations that we'll be better off. i've got a different view. i think we've got to invest in education and training. >> now it started strong there but then mitt romney pushed back and took chris wallace's point, the president had not been challenged this directly in a longtime and didn't really counter punch with mitt romney. now the president has another thing to deal with which is that

tomorrow he's got a new jobs report for the month of september. so that is going to be yet another thing right after this debate, the tough performance where if that is a tough jobs report this could be a whole new case. bill: was governor romney more personal in this debate and more personal than the obama team expect stphed. >> h expected? >> he certainly seemed to be. the president left a lot on the table, did not bring up bain capital, or the 47% video. didn't hit mitt romney on the obvious things. we've heard so much out on the trail about how the president kebts better with real people and mitt romney can't do that. take a listen what mitt romney said early on about how he feels people struggled. >> yesterday i was a rally in denver and a woman came up to her with a baby in her arms and said ann by husband has had four jobs in three years, part time jobs. he's lost his most recent job and we've now just lost our home. can you help us?

and the answer is, yes, we can help, but it's going to take a different path. >> reporter: the question for mitt romney moving forward, can he continue to connect with voters in that personal way? the question for the president, what barack obama shows up? at this rally in denver what i'm going to be backing for is he someone who took a punch last night and is struggling and still shaken or does he get off the can vs. and say this is a wake up call, i'm ready to go for the final stretch bill. bill: thank you. i'll show you in the touch-screen behind me where the travel dates go today. some of these dates you see repeated over and over again. it tells a very interest -lg story about thinteresting story about the strategies in 2008. red is republican, blue is republican. the president wakes up in colorado he has a rally about noontime in denver. he was the clear winner over senator mccain by 9 points.

the polls now are too close to call. here is what is interesting, later today as we mentioned earlier the president goes to wisconsin. someone argued this is the bluest of blue. he was the clear winner over john mccain by 14 points four years ago. with paul ryan in the place perhaps that tells us about the polling internally that democrats are seeing in wisconsin. as for governor romney he wakes up in colorado as well and meets up with his running nature paul ryan in the state of virginia, which went for a democrat for the first time since 1964 four years ago, and where will ryan and romney be today? this is agusta county, it bumps pretty close-up to the west virginia border. red is republican, blue is democrat. this part of the state arguably is coal company, which is one of the comments that governor romney made last night. as we watch the map develop and we see the strategies unfold that's where the two men are going today.

martha, back to you. martha: very interesting. what does bill o'reilly think about governor romney's performance last night? he will join us here in "america's newsroom" with his first take, his first reaction to the big night last night. bill: looking forward to that, huh? martha: yeah. bill: the number one issue if you haven't heard, jobs, jobs and more jobs. who made the better argument on how to create more jobs, america, herman cain is live on that today, stay tuned. martha: new concerns our government failed to secure highly sensitive documents that were left behind after the deadly attack on our consulate in libya. how could that happen? we are live in washington. [ male announcer ] eligible for medicare?

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bill: a hero's escort for a u.s. border patrol agent killed in the line of duty. the body of nicholas ivie driven to a tpaoup funeral home in arizona. they were attacked along a known smuggling route near the mexican border in arizona. they remember him as a good agent and kind father. >> being involved in a law enforcement position is one where you literally risk all, and he was willing to do that, and in the end he gave his all. very soft-spoken, gentle giant if you will. bill: he was 30 years old, married, father of two and we remember him fondly. martha: many political experts saying that governor romney had to go in there last night and

shakeup the 2012 race during that debate if he wanted to do well when it came to the actual voting in the beginning of november. he and the president battled over issues on the economy, they talked about healthcare. so, how did mitt romney do last night? let's talk to herman cain. he debated governor romney several times during the primaries, a former presidential candidate of course and also the ceo of godfather's pizza. good morning, mr. cain happy to have you here. >> thanks, martha, happy to be here. martha: you're one of the people that has been on stage with mitt romney in the past. did you see a different mitt romney in anyway last night? >> i saw the same mitt romney that i saw when i was debating him during the republican primary, because i expected him to go in prepared, which he was. he was knowledgeable, which he was. and his depth of knowledge and his demand of the facts as he was rebutting the different statements made by the president was absolutely impressive.

i thought last night overall was a defining moment for mitt romney because he didn't get streamed through the mainstream media. the american people got to see the mitt romney that i know and a lot of people that have debated him know. martha: we have been told that he was looking forward to that opportunity to just go head-to-head on the stage and to sort of rebut some of the things that he said he had been misrepresented on. let's play a little bit of sound from last night, and this goes to the issue of how the president spent his capital, so to speak in the early days of his presidency. let's watch. >> i just don't know how the president could have come into office facing 23 million people out of work, rising unemployment, an economic crisis at the kitchen table and spent his energy and passion fo for two years fighting for owe bottofor obamacare instead of fighting jobs for the american people. martha: what do you think of that statement? the president came become and

said he did both, he worked on obamacare and the jobs market as well. >> unfortunately he did not. see, here is what i have observed and a lot of people have observed about president obama. he does not know how jobs are created. he thinks jobs are created by spending money on government, and that is not the case. so i believe that governor romney was absolutely right on when he said that he invested too much capital in obamacare, which was his personal objective. you will recall, martha, that the person people when they were polled they didn't want that version of obamacare, they didn't want that version but he passed it anyway rather than focus on how you really create jobs. so i believe that governor romney nailed him on that. martha: we're talking to you about jobs here. here is another piece of sound last night that has to do a little bit with the way that money has been spent on the new energy spropbt. let' front. let's watch. >> don't forget you put $90 billion, like 50 years worth

of breaks into solar and wind, to lind to solyndra, and tekskla. i had a friend that said you don't just pick the winners, you pick the losers. martha: that got a laugh from the reaction. it goes to the heart of the question as to whether the government should be attempting to pick winners and losers in new technology. >> and they should not. this is a perfect example of how governor romney was so prepared, that $90 billion number that he used to refute the president's claim that oil companies make too much money. secondly president obama tries to take advantage of people's lack of understanding that there is a difference between a profit and a profit margin. he takes advantage of the fact that a lot of people don't understand that oil companies have to invest billions of dollars over many years to make that profit. and so when governor romney came

back with the $90 billion i thought that was an excellent statistic to refute the misinformation that the president was trying to get people to believe. martha: yeah, you know you touch on something here that i want to ask you about before you go. he called out a number of different industries last night. he said you need exxon mobil needs any more money, he talked about insurance companies which definitely have been sort of somebody that he has no -- has no reference for in the health insurance process. he talked about wall street a little bit last night and fat cats, does anybody need any more money in those areas. what do you think about that? >> i think that is just aggravated class warfare. it's not up to the president to decide how much money somebody makes or how much money that a company makes, that's what is wrong with his eye deol joe an ideology and his thinking about how you make this nation more

proprosper rust. president obama says the governor should control this. that is tote lal lee against what has made this country great and represents 25% of the world gdp and he wants to slow it down by telling how much people should make, saying well haven't you made enough money yet? no, that is not the way america works and the free enterprise system works with. martha: thank you mr. cain, good to see you. >> thank you, martha. bill: there is a speech from ten years ago that has gone public. what the president said about the rich. what did he mean? we will analyze that for you in a moment. martha: both of these gentlemen last night laid out what they would do about medicare which is a pressing issue in our budget and for everybody out there. what it could mean for you. >> if the president were to be reelected you're going to see a $716 billion cut to medicare. you'll have 4 million people who will lose medicare advantage.

you'll have hospital and providers that will no longer accept medicare patients. >> in medicare what we did was we said we are going to have to bring down the costs if we're going to deal with our long-term deficits. but to do that, let's look at where some of the money is going. two years ago, the people of bp made a commitment to the gulf. and every day since, we've worked hard to keep it. bp has paid over twenty-three billion dollars to help people and businesses who were affected, and to cover cleanup costs.

today, the beaches and gulf are open for everyone to enjoy -- and many areas are reporting their best tourism seasons in years. we've shared what we've learned with governments and across the industry so we can all produce energy more safely. i want you to know, there's another commitment bp takes just as seriously: our commitment to america. bp supports nearly two-hundred-fifty thousand jobs in communities across the country. we hired three thousand people just last year. bp invests more in america than in any other country. in fact, over the last five years, no other energy company has invested more in the us than bp. we're working to fuel america for generations to come. today, our commitment to the gulf, and to america, has never been stronger.

bill: there was a tape surfacing and going public on youtube now that is causing problems for the obama team. it was reportedly recorded at the university of chicago on martin luther king day 2002. he said, quote, i don't know if you noticed rich people are all for nonviolence. why wouldn't they be? they've got what they want. they want to make sure that nobody is going to take their stuff. there is a lot more after that. john fund, national columnist for the "national review."

we are not legally allowed to run the clip so we'll do the best we can to fill in the blanks here. this is ten years ago, what happened? >> first of all it's astonishing that we see tape after tape from obama's past surface when he's running for election. the vetting in 2008 is obviously very poor or the tapes won't be surfacing now. this tape is fascinating. what barack obama was saying back then, he was a state senator, is look there is all kinds of anger in the community and injustices. obviously we are against violence. there's two kinds of violence, the violence that poor people might inflict on the rich people because they are jealous and they want their stuff, but there is the violence that rich people perpetrate on those below them using tax breaks and shutting down businesses that have been in communities for a longtime, that is a form of violence too. and frankly, to equate the two is just bizarre. i think it's very -- a very troubling parallel that barack

obama is drawing there. bill: in the speech he talked about the spirit of empathy. i think that was around the enron time, because he talked about the employees of enron feel that they've been violated. how did that fit into this argument, or this speech that he was make stph-g. >> yo making? >> as far as that goes i agree. enron was run by a bunch of crooks, and they deserved to go to jail and many of them did. obviously there was justifiable anger, people lost their retirement and pensions, but to equate that as he does later in the speech saying, well, you know, a community has had this company there, it's provided jobs for many years, and the company decides to shut down, because of economic conditions, that's a form of violence, you know, that could be used to justify all kinds of behavior, and not just union strikes, but actual union violence. bill: you pointed to a ""washington post"" interview in 2007. that is five years ago. what emerged from that interview that caught your eye?

>> well, barack obama was the community organizationer. the father of community organizing was saul olinski. he was very controversial in his day. barack obama told "the washington post" that the finest education i ever received was at the feet of the saul olinski disciples in chicago. he was all about the ends justifies the means, reality was flexible and you had to shakeup the man, because it had to be challenged. this was radical stuff that olinski was talking about. bill: if we get to run the tape we'll run a full analysis and talk about what was said and why. thank you for coming in this morning. martha: there are new concerns this morning over the deadly attack in libya that killed four americans, including ambassador chris stevens. what was left behind at the consulate that could fall into the wrong hands and has

america's intelligence community very worried this morning, a live report. bill: don't go anywhere, bill o'reilly is live in a moment with his first take on the big debate, night number one. are you receiving a payout from a legal settlement or annuity over 10 or even 20 years? call imperial structured settlements. the experts at imperial can convert your long-term payout into a lump sum of cash today.

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protection risk free-- that's right, 60 days risk free-- use promo code: notme. order now and get this document shredder to keep sensitive documents out of the wrong bill: strong new reaction in last night's presidential debate and what was not brought up on the big stage. here is a clip now on the topic of education. have a list stpwhrepb when h a listen. >> when he tells a student that you should borrow money from your parents to go to college, that indicates the degree to which, you know, there may not be as much of a focus on the fact that folks like myself, folks like michelle, kids probably who attend university of denver just don't have that

option. >> mr. president you're entitled as a president to your own airplane and your own house but not to your own facts. i'm not going to cut education funding. bill: one of the zingers last night. bill o'reilly good morning to you thank you for your time. you've written a new book "killing kennedy." i'll get to that in a moment, i know you like the way that came out a great deal. what did you think of last night? >> reporter: well, if you had any doubt about who won you switch over to msnbc and it was all black. it was like a funeral procession right through there. they were distraught. so then of course i switched back to the fox news channel and got some objective analysis. the problem with president obama is he came off as a boring, college professor. that's how he came off. i was surprised. he's usually much more

energetic, he looked tired, and mr. romney, you know, he had his facts at his fingertips. he didn't do anything extraordinary, but he was just much more focused, so the contrast between romney and obama really put the governor over-the-top. i see it as more obama lost it than romney won it. bill: that is interesting. >> i'll tell you why in a moment. bill: before the debate started, you were encouraging romney to be aggressive, to really go for it, and rove and morris were saying to you, no, no, no that is not the way to go. >> right. and romney followed their advice and not mine, and that's where i think he made a mistake. when you're in a prize fight, a boxing match, and that's what a debate is, a verbal boxing match and you see your opponent tired or weak you go in and you hammer him.

the governor didn't do that. what the governor should have done at the end when he clearly had won the debate, and he knew he had won, was in his closing statement of two minutes, said, look into the cameron said, i just want you to know that i feel compelled to improve this nation. we are in trouble here in america. we are in trouble. and everybody should know it. and unfortunately the president, who may be a good man, has no answers, none, but i do, and i have to turn this around, and with your help i will. and he didn't do the knockout. he won by a lot on points but he didn't knock him to the ground when he could have. bill: i thought his style was more to your point but he did it in a much more subtle way. >> he came across as nonthreatening, and of course to me that's --

[laughter] >> i'm mr. threatening i guess. bill: i want to ask you about this. bill, because these flash polls come out. this is really a taste of emotion in the moments after the debate, but cbs found 56% of the people they polled said that their views of romney have changed for the better, so does last night now put this campaign on a different course? >> that is certainly true it does. this is huge for romney, i mean enormous. but the people who change their minds because -- on that kind of a shallow situation, i mean, i don't even take them seriously. but the important point is this. mitt romney now has reenergized his campaign, his fundraising will increase. it will make it more difficult for the president to run the pop grand today tv ads. people now have seen romney and they have seen him tell the president, hey look, you're not telling the truth about my record, i have five boys. that was his best line.

i have five boys, they say stuff that isn't true all the time, they say it until they think i'm going to believe him. that was his best line of the night. bill: you were saying why owe bottom why obama lost this. have you thought about why we got this president obama last notice and not someone that was more aggressive or someone that the left wanted to go after with governor romney. >> i'm not a psychiatrist, so i don't really know. it looked to me like barack obama was distracted. the fact that he didn't even bring up the governor's gaffe of 47% being slackers, he didn't even bring that up, that was amazing. i kept waiting for it, and he just -- bill: it never happened. the question is why, bill? >> it's impossible to answer that question, hemmer. i can't answer. bill: is it possible you're insulated by too few folks

telling you the same thing every day. >> it's possible he took a cold medicine. nobody knows. i don't even bother speculating in that regard. it was a very big night for the president, he did not bring his a game. that is the fact, that is what happened, and now the campaign changes. you'll see it in the polls, romney will be ahead now in a bunch of swing states. nationally he'll probably go ahead by one or two, but we've got two more debates and believe me when i tell you barack obama is not going to be as flat next time around. bill: it will be the biggest headline copping up in ten days as to how much preparation he's putting into this and what his daly schedule is. now the book, you like it, "killing kennedy." why should we read it? >> look, i was a freshman in high school when kennedy was killed and i remember everything about it and so does everybody who was alive at that time, and they remember where they were and all the details, and my maternal grandmother, her name

was winnifred kennedy. i have kennedys in my family. it was personal to me. i wanted to tell everybody what happened to jfk, how he actually was killed, the events leading up to it and who he was, both good and bad and we succeeded. in the first day of release, this tuesday of this week "killing kennedy" sold more than 100,000 copies in 24 hours. stpho: that is impressive. what do we learn that is new? >> everything. we had access to the fbi guys who were in dallas right after the murder, primarily the guy who was assigned to marine os walled. mahmoud rina oswald. we know everything about oswald from the time h he shot the president.

we have people that were with him and all the details, some good some bad. the most harrowing part of the book was the death of his baby, patrick. it changed his life forever, it changed kennedy. i get into that pretty heavily. it's not just a book about the murder of the president, it's a book about him. bill: thank you, bill, looking forward to reading it. >> okay, guys, thank you a lot. bill: "killing kennedy" the new book, we'll see you later tonight in pry time for a lot more debate fallout as all this stuff starts to gather and marinate. thank you bill. martha: governor romney firing back after barack obama accused him of wanting to change medicare into a voucher system. >> i support no change for medicare, and the president supports taking $716 billion out of that program. martha: with 48 million people covered by medicare right now which of these two men has it

right? what did the president say to come back from that. a fair & balanced debate right after this. ildren laughing ] [ slap! slap! slap! ] [ music, laughter stop ] [ male announcer ] when your favorite foods fight you, fight back fast with tums smoothies. so fast and smooth, you'll forget you had heartburn. ♪ tum tum tum tum tums [ male announcer ] tums smoothies. flavor, meet food. it's time for swanson flavor boost. concentrated broth in easy to use packets. mix it into skillet dishes, for an instant dose of... hell-o! [ female announcer ] get recipes at flavorboost.com.

when we got married. hell-o! i had three kids. and she became the full time mother of three. it was soccer, and ballet, and cheerleading, and baseball. those years were crazy. so, as we go into this next phase, you know, a big part of it for us is that there isn't anything on the schedule.

bill: scary scene out of for the myers florida, a 12-year-old in critical condition after being struck by lightning. the boy hit after school east was heading to football practice. a local pastor holding prayers for the child said this was so sudden. >> they were just being released from their classroom setting and had grabbed their practice gear

and were just kind of making single file run out to the field. it was a completely fine day, it wasn't even as overcast as it is now and just no hint of any kind of a problem and then completely out of the blue the tragedy happened. bill: paramedics say through cpr they were able to bring back the boy's pulse. family and friends praying for a full and complete recovery. so are we. martha: we talked a lot this morning about the economy and what happened last night in that category. president obama and governor romney also battled quite a bit last night over the issue of medicare. >> we have 4 million people on medicare advantage that will lose medicare advantage because of those $716 billion in cuts. i can't understand how you can cut medicare $716 billion for current recipients of medicare. >> every study has shown that medicare has lower administrative costs than private insurance does, which is

why seniors are generally pretty happy witness, and private insurers have to make a profit. there is nothing wrong with that. that's what they do. martha: all right. we have a great panel to talk about this. mark sanford is the former governor of south carolina. doug schoen is a former pollster to bill clinton, and monica crowley is a fox news contributor. here is a central issue to this. this $716 billion that they claim a president romney would cut from the program, and romney says, look, you're already doing it as part of your obamacare program, you've already taken that money, but you've taken it from people who are using medicare right now. governor sanford? >> well, let's first off recognize the truth in terms of numbers. it's not a cut when you think about a cut in your family budget, like i had a hundred dollars and now i'm going to have 80.

this is a cut over the next ten years in the rate of increase in medicare. first of all i think it's important to get our arms around what we're really talking about. both camps are guilty of whatever this $700 billion cut is, again cut in the increase in medicare and both are ignoring the larger issue of an unsustainable system. you're looking at a 30 trillion liability with medicare overall, you're looking at a clearly unsustainable system in that right now the trust fund is a fiction, and right now this year the system will run about a $28 billion deficit. so something has got to change and that's what this debate ultimately is all about. martha: the fine point on that argument last night was whether or not you want to get some competition involved and private enter prize involved in this or not. the president said, people are happy with medicare, they like it. governor romney is saying under your plan they aren't going to have it any more the way they

did even if they are 55 and over. >> your second point is where i'll start. people like medicare, they like the prescription drug benefit, they don't want to cut it. what governor romney succeed ned doing last nighsucceeded in doing last night was raising questions about obama care and the president's plan about medicare. he introduced the notion of competition into the system. the president sought to portray that as a sroup ercis them that would cut medicare for retirees around 54, 55, those coming into the system in the near future. i don't think president obama succeeded on an issue, martha, ha has been a big democratic advantage. i thought governor romney was compelling, no knockouts, no clear decision on the issue but we'll keep going on this issue in the next three debates, particularly the vice presidental. martha: we certainly will. i think it was interesting, at one point president obama said even if you're close to 55 i think you'll be a little nervous

about that, sort of thinking that that line wasn't enough and people under that age should be concerned about it as well. monica, doug just brought up the vice presidental debate. so much of this will focus on paul ryan. they wern the democratic side when paul ryan was picked. they said, oh, when tha that voucher plan was brought up, they'll kill him on that. >> i agree with doug, he really hit obama hard on obamacare and medicare pointing out how the obamacare law december mates medicare, and medicare advantage as well which is also a very popular program because it is partly private. i think what you'll see coming up in the next couple of weeks, but certainly in the vice presidental debate, martha, as you mentioned, is that paul ryan is this is his signature issue, and the point romney was making, the point ryan is going to make is look, younger voters, sort of my generation and younger -rpb

, we all recognize that medicare and all of these other programs are not going to be here for us unless there is serious reform. what romney and ryan want to do is save these programs for the younger voters. what romney also did very effectively, is he understands, and ryan updzs ver understands very well that older voters have to understand that nothing will change for them. in the future they will be taken care of but younger voters will have the option of medicare or the premium support option to choose from. that is an argument they've been making and was made very clear last night and i think paul ryan is going to take up the torch and run with it next week. martha: governor, obviously there are a lot of older voters in south carolina and all the way down to florida which is a huge battle state as we all know. how does this play with them? >> i think ultimately the greatest constituency if you will for an older voter is their kids and grand kids. what they are hearing is, you take the first blurb in terms of politics and you'd say well they

just care about themselves. no, i would argue, you know, when i talk to my mom she cares most deeply mourn about me, than ultimately about our kids. i would say one this is a generational question in terms of politics of saying, wait a minute, is this sis sep sustainable. and by any numbers you take the numbers are not sustainable, something has to be changed. i would say older folks aren't stupid and they know the system isn't going to be there for their grand kids. martha: monica you made that point as well. i think people don't get enough credit for understanding the rye alternates of that situation. than realities of that situation. thank you for being here. bill: jenna lee is standing by. hospitals rolls our by in eleven days. jenna: there is still not a lot of news today. bill: i have one guest what you're talking about. what is happening? jenna: campaign reset, that's what many analysts are talking

about the debate between mitt romney and president obama. we'll have the ""weekly standard"'s bill crystal who says it was the best performance by a republican in two decades. an outbreak of meningitis kills four ancic evens dozens in this country. turkey and syria exchange fire, are we getting closer to an all-out war in that region? plus the fbi is hunting for a terrorist and is asking for your help. we are going to have all that for you coming up at the top of the hour. bill: packed show, jenna thank you we will heee see yo will see you in ten minutes on that. there are new concerns over the deadly attack that killed four americans in libya. what was left behind that could be dangerous if it falls into the wrong hands? a live report on that.

bill: other news now. we want to get to that quickly. there are new concerns the u.s. failed to secure sensitive documents left behind after the deadly attack on the american consulate in benghazi, libya. this comes now as the obama administration is facing serious questions about its handling of intelligence and security before that attack on 9/11. catherine herridge more on this now live in washington. what are we learning about the witnesses there. >> thank you and good morning. the letter from the outside government oversight committee is asking the state department to provide two witnesses for the hearing on security next week including state department regional security officer eric nordstrom who was stationed in libya from september of last year until june 2012. the committee chaired by darrell issa was briefed by him which confirmed 13 threats against the u.s. consulate in six months before the attack and that the mission was repeatedly asking for extra security with claims that american security was cut to increase the reliance on

local li libyan security. also that will be published today by the state department about its internal investigation into the attack known as an accountability review board or arb. it reads in part the board will submit its conclusions and recommendations to secretary clinton within 60 days of its first meeting unless the chair determines a need for additional time. in simple terms that means there is no legal limit on the investigation, or time limit, rather or a deadline, so we should not expect anything before the election, bill. bill: but we have also this report, then, catherine about sensitive documents found at the consulate this late in the game? >> well, more than three weeks after the attack the consulate in benghazi is still not secure, and according to the "washington post" who has had a reporter on the ground in benghazi sensitive documents including the ambassador's itinerary, personnel files and attempts to round up loose weapons could be found in plain sight. we reported a week ago that the consulate did not appear to fit

the required physical security standards for posting in a high-risk for terrorism or civil unrest area. this is designed to give the ambassador and his team an hour, it's sometimes called a golden hour where they can burn classified documents and call in emergency evacuation. what is clear from that reporting from the newspaper on the ground is that none of that happened. i would argue that there was a waiver signed here in washington d.c., i'm told by someone senior within the state department to allow the ambassador to operate at that consulate given that the physical security was not meeting these prescribed standards, bill. bill: thank you. more when we get it. thank you. martha: we are following developments on a deadly men inch skwraoeut advertismen even skwraoeut advertismen anddead dangerous meninjitis outbreak.

what is behind this. we'll have that next. ♪ ♪ ♪ we're lucky, it's not every day you find a companion as loyal as a subaru. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru.

bill: number one is in the books. martha: number one is in the books. bill: three more to om look a to go. red is presidential debates and blue is vice presidental. ryan and biden will get a mix of foreign policy and domestic policy. martha: on the 16th it will be both as well. and then the foreign policy one. bill: you have danville, kentucky, then you go to